Come budget, digital pay will be less taxing for customers

The government will make it cheaper for people to transact digitally through taxation measures for digital payments as it aims to transform the way Indians pay for goods and services. It will be part of a series of measures to further the demonetisation exercise underway since November, and will be announced soon with more measures expected in the annual budget, according to Amitabh Kant, chief executive of government think tank NITI Aayog. “We will make digital transactions cheaper than cash transactions, and the market forces will take over,“ said Kant while speaking at an annual not-for-profit initiative of the alumni of the Indian Institutes of Technology in Bengaluru on Saturday .

Currently cash transactions, don't attract an additional charge while those transacting digitally are levied a fee. “The government is saying it will ensure people with digital transactions are supported through various taxation measures.That will happen in the next few days. Several measures have been announced by the finance minister but many more will be announced in the budget, I am sure,“ said Kant.

Last week, NITI Aayog announced several awards for people using digital transactions, including a . 1crore prize.` Kant, who was attending a startup event hosted by the IIT alumnus association, urged Indian startups to target global markets to improve India's exports, citing the example of countries such as Japan, China and South Ko rea that have seen massive growth by selling to overseas markets. Kant ex horted Indian fo unders to think global. “Uber operates in 500 cities and Tesla is penetrating all global mar kets... All our star tups are thinking small in size and scale,“ he said.

The government was throwing open `grand challenges' to solve several issues in the country . “We have identified six key problems from thousands of problems that India needs a solution for from the rest of the world,“ Kant said, but did not elaborate on the chosen areas.

Some states such as Karnataka and Gujarat have also opened similar grand challenges for startups to offer innovative solutions in critical development issues.